


Till Human Voices Wake Us

by Deborah Laymon (dejla), dejla



Series: Gotham City [2]
Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan), Iron Man (Movieverse)
Genre: Community: wip_amnesty, Multi, genderbender
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-22
Updated: 2010-12-22
Packaged: 2017-10-13 23:27:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/142873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dejla/pseuds/Deborah%20Laymon, https://archiveofourown.org/users/dejla/pseuds/dejla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony Stark needs some answers about Stark munitions falling into the wrong hands. And it appears that Bruce Wayne might have some answers.</p><p>Part of the What if Bruce Wayne were a woman? universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Till Human Voices Wake Us

**Author's Note:**

> Mixing Marvel and DC -- and Batman is a woman.

Till Human Voices Wake Us

"The time is now 12:30 pm." Jarvis' English-butler voice interrupted Pepper's work.

She hadn't eaten lunch yet. Certainly Tony wouldn't have eaten yet. She set the laptop down and reached for her earpiece.

"Pepper!" Tony's head popped onto her laptop screen. In the background, she heard the sounds of metal being machined. One of his mechanical assistants must be smoothing out the bullet holes from the last mission. That mission had cost her two sleepless nights plus two 24-count packages of Pepcid Complete. _I should buy stock in the company._

Lunch would be delayed. She didn't sigh. She waited.

"You talked to Bruce Wayne yet?"

For the sixth time in half as many days, she said, "No. Her assistant keeps saying she'll call back but she hasn't." His question had, after all, only occurred once per day prior to the last three days.

"Pepper, I'm shocked. You're slipping. You're letting a secretary intimidate you?"

MeiLin Ang was no more a secretary than Pepper herself. Pepper dug her teeth into her lower lip. Talking to the head of Wayne Enterprises appeared to be as easy as communicating with Tony. "She's doing the same thing I do when people call you, unless I know you want to speak with them. I can send an email--"

His experiences hadn't made him any less abrupt. "No. Not an email."

No, an email would get lost in the system as a phone call did, but it was a reasonable suggestion. It occurred to Pepper that half of her conversations with her boss were entirely imaginary. What she needed him to invent was a device which would let her read his thoughts… "If you told me why you wanted to speak to her, then I might be able to work around her assistant."

"What's her name?"

"Why?" And why did he assume that Bruce Wayne's assistant was female?

"I can call her." His tone added a smug "no woman can resist me" to the words.

 _Except for me_. _No. On second thought, I'm much better off **not** reading his mind._ "Mr. Stark. **You** do not speak to assistants. That is what **I** do."

He inhaled, obviously thought better of whatever he was about to say, and exhaled. Then he said, "Fine. Tell them to fire up the plane and get a course approved for Gotham City. And find me a hotel."

Pepper pulled up Jarvis' travel database. She keyed in parameters and waited until a list of hotels and amenities opened. "How long do you expect to be?"

"Do I know that yet? It depends on what I find out."

 _And what in the hell are you trying to find out?_ Now she sighed. She seemed to be doing that more than usual. "Tony, I'm not asking for mathematical certainty. Give me an **estimate**."

Tools clattered somewhere near him in the workroom. His voice went distant, directed elsewhere. "Butterfingers, tools on the shelf, not on the floor." His voice returned, directed at her again. "Start with two days."

"Fine." The Taj Gotham would do. Jarvis approved of the extensive exercise room—with attractive gym attendants for clients of Tony's standing—and the minibars in the rooms. _Weights, treadmill, wheat grass drinks, and expensive Scotch_. She pulled up the checklist, working through it step-by-step. Tony's head popped up on screen, killing two paragraphs of a letter in progress in another window. She'd complained about the glitch before, but suspected it secretly amused him, since he hadn't fixed it.

"Give me the number for Chloe Sullivan."

"Who?"

He pitched his voice over the machinery hum. "Chloe Sullivan."

She sent the voice-capture into his address book; this would take a few seconds. A few seconds was usually too long when he was in one of his manic moods. Chloe Sullivan's entry appeared, with rather more information than usual. The home address was in Gotham City—something called the Windhover Apartments. The work address was the Gotham City Herald-Tribune, Local News Department. A work number and a cell number were listed. Pepper marked both and sent the numbers through Jarvis. Tony had asked for the number; he hadn't asked her to make the call. If he wasn't going to ask her to make the call, she wasn't going to offer.

Chloe was probably blonde. Tony seemed to have a thing for blonde reporters. Brunettes elsewhere.

 _No redheads, though--_

Pepper scowled at her computer screen as she returned to the numerous stack of letters, emails, and bills waiting to be handled. Then she'd need to see to packing him for two days.

*** *** ***

Chloe glanced up at the clock. Six-eighteen. She switched her attention back to her monitor, drafted the last paragraph, and closed her eyes. Counting off to sixty in her head seemed a little silly, but it did give her a breather… She opened her eyes, read the paragraph through, edited it, read it one more time, then clenched her teeth and told herself to consider it done. An email sent to her editor; there, she was done and still had time to change before she met Clark for dinner.

Her phone rang.

She jerked around, staring at it. It was six-twenty-six. Her day ended at five-thirty. Supposedly ended. It rang again, and she ground her teeth, glaring at it and willing it to shut up.

It rang once more.

Chloe picked it up. "Herald-Tribune, local news department, Sullivan speaking."

A car engine roared, then shifted down. "Chloe!" Male, cheerful, vaguely familiar, with a tendency to cut off the end of his words. Definitely not Clark Kent or Ollie Queen. "Tony Stark here. Got a minute?"

 _Tony-- **Stark**??_ Chloe glanced up at the clock again, and then at her wristwatch. She'd kill herself later if she said no now. "Yeah, but only a minute."

"On your way out?"

"Yes." Too late, she thought she shouldn't have said that.

"Good. I'll pick you up in five minutes and we can talk over dinner."

"Mr. Stark, I--"

"Don't worry about changing; I'm casual myself tonight. There'll be a security guard on the building, won't there? I'll get him to call up when I arrive." The connection cut.

Chloe took the phone away from her ear and stared at it. After a second, she said a long string of words that would have made Ollie laugh hysterically. How was she going to start this? 'Clark, I have to beg off… Clark, something's come up--'   _No, don't go there._ _With Tony Stark, god only knows what might come up._

Clark did sound genuinely disappointed. Her ego bounced up a level or two. Then he said, "Well, I know you've got to catch a story where ever it is," and her ego slid right back down to the basement.

"Look, I have met him. Twice." She didn't mention having turned him down twice. "I don't know why he's in town, but I don't think he came all the way to Gotham City just to give me an exclusive on Stark Industries."

"Chlo, that's not what I meant. I mean--of course anyone would want to take you out. And of course you'd rather go out with him than with--"

Shame flooded up her spine. Clark was really too easy to hurt. "No, really, I wouldn't. I'm curious, that's all. You said you might be coming by next month?"

"I'll be in town next week. Another one of the Gotham City projects that Perry wants a scoop on, and I might be able to talk Bruce out of something she's already given you an exclusive on."

Her ego edged up a flight and a half. "She doesn't give me **every** exclusive. She doesn't dare. Every other paper in town would be gunning for her, and Bruce knows how to play politics." Inspiration hit her between the eyes. "I wonder if he's here to see Bruce?"

"Why would he be--"

"You didn't hear me say that. That is completely off-the-record, Kent."

He started to laugh. "Okay. No x-ray vision, no super-hearing. Promise." After a moment, the laugh vanished. "Hey, **I** know Stark's reputation. You be careful, okay?"

"I don't think you have to worry. He's been a monk since that incident in Afghanistan and this Iron Man business. Hasn't hit National Inquirer or ET once. Completely off People's radar."

"He's him and you're you. I know you're sensible, but him I don't trust."

"Him you don't trust. I'm going to tell him you said that."

Clark snorted. "Oh, please. As if he'd know my byline. Be careful. May I call you tomorrow?"

Sweet and formal, like Clark always was these days. Not sure where he stood--which was a life change from Smallville. "Okay. I'll be in at my usual."

"Good night."

"You be careful too, Clark."

"I always am."

As she ended the call and started to put her iPhone away, a raspy baritone interrupted from behind her, "Going to tell me who said what?"

Chloe dropped the phone.

Tony Stark moved faster than she expected; he scooped up the phone before she could bend over. He glanced at the display before he handed her the phone. "Clark Kent. Metropolis, isn't it? Daily Planet? Recent twelve-week series on crime and terrorism being funded by bootleg software?"

"Ah--yeah." Chloe blinked. "He didn't think you'd recognize his name."

"Good series. Like the one you did on corruption in the Gotham City Parking Commission. I recognize good reporting when I read it." He crossed his arms in the iconic Tony-Stark fashion. "So what did your Mr. Kent say about me?"

"He's not my Mister Kent. And he doesn't trust you."

Tony blinked. He said nothing at all for a moment, then jerked his head sideways and back, with a nastily-amused twist of his mouth. "Wise man. Come on. We've got reservations at Maritime."

" **Maritime**!" The word burst out before she could bite it back.  Maritime was the hottest restaurant in Gotham City at the moment, and reservations were six months on a waiting list. _Yeah, but you're not Tony Stark, are you? Or the Herald-Tribune's food critic._

"Too public? Don't worry. No paparazzi following me at the moment." He stopped in the elevator door to consider that, grinned at her, then said, "I think," and stepped in as the doors closed.

"Mr. Stark, if we end up on the cover of People--"

"You'll get switched to national news because of the publicity, and you'll be grateful to me for the rest of your life."

Chloe stared at him for a moment, realized her mouth was open as if she were some teenager staring at a rock star, and snapped her jaw shut.

Tony's grin widened. He offered her an arm.

They stepped out of the Daily Planet building. A jodhpur-clad motorcycle policeman sat in front of an Audi roadster, with the motorcycle's lights flashing.

Only Tony Stark would park a rented luxury car in a No Standing spot and have a cop sit and watch it for him. Only Tony Stark would rent an Audi--

 _Audi convertible. Oh joy._ She ran a hand over her hair, images of looking like someone dumb enough to stick her finger in a light socket flooding her mind.

He thanked the policeman, who nodded, revved his motorcycle, and roared off.  Tony held the door for her, leaned over her, reached into the glove compartment, and whisked out an Hermes scarf with a magician's flourish. "They tell me nothing's worse than hair in your eyes."

 _No, I am not naive enough to ask you who 'they' are._ She assumed the Audi was a rental; what she'd read of Stark Industries' private jets didn't suggest they included enough cargo room for a car. The roadster showed off every fraction of Tony's driving skills--or else Tony showed off every fraction of his driving skills. After the first turn, Chloe settled down to enjoy the ride. The Maritime overlooked the upper harbors, the yacht basin and the Atlantic, not the grimier sections of the docks near the Narrows.

The Audi swung past the Narrows Bridge and on up the East River Drive. The Narrows were no longer lost, but they were still not an area for an evening ramble. Cops still went in there in squads, wearing riot gear. Bruce tended to go grim and silent when the Narrows were mentioned. Batman patrolled the Narrows like a hunting tiger.

"Deep thoughts?"

Chloe shook herself. That would never do: getting distracted around Tony Stark. "Where are you staying, Mr. Stark? Or are you flying out tonight?"

A lopsided smile hovered a second on his face, even though sunglasses hid his eyes. "Depends."

"On what?" _Ooh, lousy parry, worse question._

Tony laughed so hard he almost missed the exit off the drive. He was still laughing when the valet came around to get the car. He was still grinning when the maître d' cut them out of the line and took them to a secluded table with a perfect view of the afternoon sun pouring down on the Sound.

Chloe tried four times during ordering drinks and dinner to find out what he wanted, but each time he slipped out from under it--twice by asking her opinion on a dish, twice by complimenting her and suggesting he'd like to discuss her questions in someplace more intimate.

"You know," she said, "you suggested something like that the last two times we were introduced and I turned you down then."

"All the better reason to suggest it again."

"Because I might change my mind?" She shook her head, but smiled anyway. Never antagonize someone with enough spare change to buy the paper and boot her out. "Thank you, Mr. Stark--"

"Tony."

"Mr.--"

He put a hand over hers: a warm, hard, calloused hand that flooded heat all the way up her arm. "Tony. We were introduced, I remembered your name the second time we met, so I'm Tony."

"All right. Tony."

He nodded. He'd already gone through a second glass of Booker's on the rocks, and still acted as sober as a night judge on Traffic Court.

The salads came. He poked at his. Chloe went on the offensive once more. "Tony, I'm flattered to have dinner with you, but there has to be some other reason behind this."

"Everybody's asking me for interviews. Maybe I wanted to pick my interviewer."

She pushed the salad aside. "That doesn't mean you get to pick your questions."

"No, but I thought the chance to ask me anything you like might earn me a brownie point or two."

She raised both eyebrows. _Now we get to it._ "What do you want the brownie points for?"

"You know Bruce Wayne fairly well."

Her stomach froze. _Does he know--?_ Then she took what she hoped was an innocuous breath before saying, "Don't believe anything you read in the tabloids."

"Tabloids? You don't write for the tabloids. You've interviewed her several times."

"Yes, I have." Although Bruce was careful to give interviews elsewhere as well.

"Then you probably know as much about her as anyone not on her immediate staff."

"Why?"

He leaned forward. The dark eyes bored through her skull. "I need to talk to her, and my assistant can't get through. How would you go about getting access?"

Her mind stopped dead. Her mouth didn't. "Tell the front desk you have an appointment. You're Tony Stark; no one's going to stop you. She always goes out of the boardroom meetings by a side door. It looks like a dark wood panel with gold leaf, and there's no sign on it. If you stand there, and you can come up with something more interesting then 'hey, have you ever been laid under a piano', she'll stop. Then you can make your pitch."

Tony laughed. "Made an impression, did I?"

"No other man's ever asked me that."

"It stopped you."

"It did." _Oh, God. Bruce is going to kill me when I tell her_.

His steak and her fish came simultaneously. The waiter hovered until they both pronounced the meals acceptable.

Chloe fished out her PDA, switched it to record, then said, "Now, about that interview?"

*** *** ***

Wayne Enterprises filled a brand-new tower built with the latest green technology. Inside, the design relied on sustainable materials, according to the info screen, but it looked as opulent as any expensive office building he'd ever seen. A respectful security guard addressed him as Mr. Stark and escorted him upstairs to the penthouse floor.

Secretaries leaned over their desks as he moved towards them. He smiled at each one as he passed. The main reception area to the boardroom had three secretaries at a curved desk, each one with an earpiece and an earnest look. He continued past the door until the long hallway dead-ended into a cross-hallway.

The door Chloe had described sat a foot from the end of the hallway, one of a series of dark wood panels, but this one was embellished with gold leaf inscribing a elaborate W. He examined it closely, and saw a set of three depressions which would have accepted a thumb and two fingers.

Old-fashioned. Wayne Enterprises might have a green building, but the presentation was still from his great-grandfather's time. _Yeah, but your great-grandfather didn't own half of Gotham City and make his money in railroads, bonds, and land…_

Tony settled himself across from the door and waited. He made a conscious effort not to fidget. Waiting was the eleventh circle of hell.

The wood panel slid into the wall next to it. Bruce stepped through it. In the heels she wore, she probably topped him at three inches. Or a bit more. She wore a scarlet suit with a walking slit, showing off incredible legs. Her black hair had been bleached white-blonde at the tips, and barely touched her shoulders--not a pre-med student in jeans and a long black braid now. _Ten years ago, Stark,_ he said to himself.

He noticed that she walked more smoothly than she had ten years ago, as well. She did as well in the three-inch-heels as Pepper did. _Pepper would kill you if she heard what you just said._

Her eyes slid over him and kept going.

Time for the hook. "Ms. Wayne! You have fifteen minutes for the man who got your virginity?"

Bruce spun around on one spiked heel, her black hair swirling like a cyclone. The Mark I's flamethrowers would have burnt him to less of a crisp. Then her mouth quirked. "Tony Stark," she said, her voice as smooth as the best Scotch, "I didn't recognize you with your pants on."  She sauntered across the room--talk about excellent bone structure--and said, loudly enough to ring off the walls, her smile all glistening white teeth, "How old was I? 14? 15?"

He pitched his voice to match. " **Twenty** ," he said. "No reason for **you** to hide your age--You were a gorgeous girl, but you're a stunning woman." He noticed that her teeth were still bared. He put up both hands and dropped the volume when he said, "Okay, you got me."

Bruce came up to him, face-to-face, her magnificent cleavage distracting him just enough that he had to jerk his attention back when she said, in a low growl, "Not yet. But I'm thinking about it."

"I'm--looking forward to it." He raised an eyebrow. "Fifteen minutes?"

Now real amusement lit up her face. "Take me to lunch and I'll give you an hour."

"That is an excellent idea. Where?"

She reached under her hair, pressed her fingers against her ear, then said, "MeiLin? Call Rostov's for me." A pause, and she said, "Now, preferably." Another pause, and she said, "Yes, thank you, have them bring my car around. I'll leave my Blackberry on." She started to take her fingers away from the earpiece, then stopped. "No, not the Rolls. My car."

They got twice as much attention walking back down the main hallway. He noticed doors opening as they walked by. Voice buzzed behind them.

"I do have a car," he said. "And it's even parked in the Wayne Tower garage." He didn't add that it was parked in the garage because this patrolman hadn't cared who the hell he was and had said so.

"I expected that. But I'd rather drive my car."

The elevator stopped at the fifth floor. A woman even taller than Bruce stepped into the elevator. "Ms. Wayne," she said.

"Noa, I appreciate the concern, but I am driving myself today. You can take the Rolls back to the manor."

Noa plastered herself against the wall, with that air of indulgent-but-faintly-annoyed acceptance he recognized as the same attitude his bodyguards showed him. "I really am not sure this is a good idea, Madam."

Bruce nodded. "And I'm aware of your objections, Noa. I have the car's GPS turned on. I will keep in touch and the Blackberry will be on."

The addition of a third body, and this one also towering over him--and Bruce--sent his heart rate up. The air in the enclosed space seemed unusually warm--he couldn't hear a fan, just the breathing of the other two people near him in the cube. He took several deep breaths, counting down the floors.

The elevator reached the lobby. Noa stepped out first, glanced around, then turned back to Bruce. "Very well, Madam. I'll take the Rolls back to the manor."

"Thank you."

Noa followed behind them, not closely enough that he felt claustrophobic. The oddest things brought on claustrophobia these days. He puzzled it over for a moment, until he saw the car sitting at the curb and thoughts of analyzing his own behavior vanished.  "My god. Is that a--a **Stutz Bearcat**?"

For the first time, he heard Bruce laugh. It sounded rusty, as if she hadn't laughed in some time. "Technically, it's a Super Bearcat. One of the last of the 1934 models. It was my great-grandfather's. Put in mothballs, along with his 1937 Duesenberg. I'm still working on restoring the Duesenberg, but this I wanted for experimental purposes."

He ran a hand along the side of the roadster, admiring the blue and silver flame paint job and the superb refinishing. "Wow. What sort of retrofit?"

"A little more luxury, better suspension, and bullet-proof glass. I kept the targa top, although I made the retraction automatic, and I rebuilt the engine. Well, I had more than a little help rebuilding the engine—I'm no engineering genius." She tossed an embarrassed grin his way: the kind of lightning-flashing, gorgeous grin that made his trousers feel much too tight.

He focused on something that wouldn't get him arrested for public indecency. "What sort of engine?"

"A 32-valve in-line 8, like the original, but it's hydrogen-powered. The fuel cell will run 500 miles before needing refueling, and she'll do 175 at top speed so far."

"Where in Gotham could you run a car at 175?"

She grinned at him. "Bludhaven NASCAR Raceway. Where else?"

He stared at her, then back at the impossible in disbelief.

Bruce said, "Can you drive stick?"

Now he glared at her. "Can a bird fly?"

She tossed him the keys. "Go ahead."

Tony did not wait for a second invitation. He held the passenger door for her, then jumped into the driver's seat. Another couple of minutes passed while he tested the starter, figured out which buttons did what, and fastened his seat belt. Bruce pulled a black silk turban out of her handbag and worked it over her hair.

"All right," he said. "So where's Rostov's?"

"Fifty-seventh and Fifth Avenue. Next to the Romanoff." She considered it. "But I suppose you're not staying at the Romanoff."

"No, at the Taj."

She nodded. "The Taj is Forty-second and Park. We're at Third and Thirty-fourth. Go up Third to Fifty-seventh and make a left, then turn right on Fifth. There's an enclosed drive, and the valet will take the car and park in the Romanoff parking garage."

"Spoken like a true native."

"You could get me around Hollywood and Las Vegas as well. Gotham is my city, Tony. I know it as well as I know my house."

He looked at her, sharply, registering the unexpected tone of affection when she talked of Gotham. "I've heard Gotham still has its troubles."

"Yes." She shrugged. "Everything does, you know. You love what you can, and you fight to change the rest."

He digested that. He wouldn't have said to any one that he loved Malibu, although he was happiest in his house and the workshop attached to it. He'd been only too happy to sell the New York penthouse his parents had owned. "Is that what the Batman does?" _No, Iron Man's not the only superhero in America, Nick. He's just the only one who's me._

"The Batman?" Bruce laughed again. "I don't know why the Batman does anything he does. Except that at the moment, he's dodging the GCPD. You ask five citizens for an appraisal of his character, you'll get six answers. He hasn't given any interviews, although I'd love to read one."  Laughter continued rippling through her voice. "Maybe Chloe will talk him into one."

The stiff breeze from the open top put a stop to further conversation. He wasn't quite crazy enough to risk trying for top speed on the East River Drive, but it was tempting. The Bearcat felt as if he were flying.

Rostov's was actually the penthouse of the Gotham Financial Tower, next to the Romanoff Hotel. The Financial Tower was almost sculpture, a great column of glass and concrete, with faux-Art Deco  treatments on the façade. Sections of the building were rotated from a straight up and down, as if a child had set blocks diagonally on top of other blocks. The GFT looked more stable than blocks, for which Tony was grateful.

The penthouse rotated, offering an ever-changing view of the city below. They were shown to a private dining room where one entire wall was a glassed-in balcony.

Rostov's itself impressed him as a combination of the Russian Tea Room and Tahoe Joe's. The décor seemed inspired by the Orient Express. Tea was served in samovars of varying sizes, coffee in silver pots. They had not only Bookers', but his favorite single malt, Oban 32-year-old. He started with that as he looked over the menu.

Bruce drank tea. Green tea, dispensed from a samovar into a glass set into a silver, handled base.

He did know how to make small talk, although Pepper would have denied that. Bruce turned out to be a much better conversationalist than the graduate student he'd met in the bar at the Waldorf-Astoria ten years ago.

Once appetizers changed for salads, and then salads for entrees, he began working out the chess game of how to ask the question he'd been pondering for a month.

He looked at her plate. "Blini and caviar?"

"Eggplant caviar."

"Don't tell me you're a vegetarian!"

Her lips curved upwards, but she answered solemnly. "Technically, a lacto-ovo-vegetarian.  The chef here knows my tastes." She speared another bit of the rolled pancake, swallowed it, and then looked at him. "You should know that your line isn't quite correct."

"My line?"

"That you got my virginity."

He stopped for a second, watching her neatly dispose of the blini. "You said—I was the first man you ever slept with."

"You were. The first man, that is."

Only one solution to that. _And my math is always right_.

Bruce lifted one eyebrow and grinned at him, mockingly. "To be truthful, I assure you it was a remarkable experience."

"Which one? Your first or me?"

The grin smoothed out into a smile. "Both. You lived up to your reputation among the Harvard sororities."

Now he had his feet back under him. "Which one did you belong to?"

"I was Pre-Med. No time for sorority life."

The information he'd gleaned from Jarvis came readily to his tongue. "You never made it to med school. And wasn't there another degree along with the Pre-Med?"

Bruce shifted. She frowned. Pushing the blini around on her plate a moment, she stared at it as if it were the only thing in the room. Then she laid her fork down and took a sip of tea. "Criminal Justice. Dual degree."

" _Magna cum laude_ on both, I seem to recall."

Bruce waved her hand. "Nothing like graduating _summa cum laude_ from MIT at 17."

"Then why not med school?"

She shrugged. "Life got in my way."

"Seven years in Asia?"

"Among other places." She took another bite of blini and another cup of tea. "Why are you here, Tony?"

"You're not reason enough?"

Bruce laughed. "I'm vain, yes, but not that vain. What is it? It was enough to make you call Chloe Sullivan and pry out of her how to get my attention. And your assistant's been trying to reach me for three weeks."

 _Hmm_. Chloe's relationship with Bruce was closer than he'd thought, if she called Bruce as soon as he dropped her at home. "Don't you know?"

"Don't you want to tell me?"

He considered that, weighing the options, deciding whether or not he would be folding before he bid. Then he leaned forward. "Why have you had people investigating Stark Industries?"

Her pleasant expression didn't change. She didn't flinch, either. Bruce finished the last bite. She wiped her mouth, laid the napkin on the table, and leaned back in the chair. "Yes. I thought that might be it."

"I've been expecting hackers for the last week." Some pressure started to build up in his chest, annoyance at her off-handed response. At her non-response.

She picked up the teacup and turned it between her hands before taking a sip. "That's illegal. I had hit a dead end, yes, but I was planning my way around it."

He frowned at her. "What do you want to know about my company?"

One eyebrow arched. " **Your** company," she echoed. "I think you know as much about your company as I knew about mine when I came back from Tibet."

The air rushed out of his lungs as if she'd punched him. "So what don't I know?"

A muscle in her jaw twitched. Bruce inhaled. She looked down at the cup again. "It's not what you don't know. It's what **I** don't know." She set the cup down, gently, and folded her hands on the table. Her eyes searched his as if trying to find her way down into his mind. "I don't know how much your Obadiah Stane was involved with my William Earle, and I need to know. I don't know how much Wayne Enterprises research was sold to Mr. Stane, and I don't know—yet—what he did with it."

"Obadiah's dead." His gut twisted with the words.

"I heard." Bruce's blue eyes never shifted. "Earle isn't. But he's not talking. So far."

He yanked his attention to the more important question on the table. "How do you know Earle was involved with Obie--with Stane at all?"

"Because before I told him he was fired, I had his files and his hard drive pulled. I got two emails out of the hard drive, but they haven't been able to crack the encryption on the remainder, and I'm not risking losing the data."

"Let me guess. They taught you that in Criminal Justice, not in Pre-Med."

The door opened on the heels of the comment. The waiter said, "Is there anything else I can get you? I hope everything is satisfactory?"

"Another  Oban single-malt," he said.

"Yes, Mr. Stark. Ms. Wayne?"

"A glass of Père Magloire 50, as usual, Petya. Thank you."

Petya nodded and closed the door behind him.

"Not a good place for discussion," Bruce said.

He nodded. "Where?"

Her eyebrows drew down; she stared past him, her jaw tightening. She shook her head. "More like when. I have meetings…" A pause while her eyes flicked back and forth, assessing, analyzing. "Not in the office."

Tony couldn't resist a needle. "You don't trust the people in your office?"

Bared teeth masqueraded as a smile again. "As much as you trust those in yours."

He clicked his tongue and glanced away. _Always got a comeback, haven't you, Wayne?_ He gave her his best all-attention expression. "Well, we could retreat to the Taj." He pressed his lips together, pretending to think about it. "Of course, that might cause some talk--you, me, and the penthouse suite at the Taj…"

Bruce's self-possession never wavered. She did raise that damned eyebrow again.

He waved the hand without the glass. "Immovable object meets irresistible force and all that." He shrugged, took another sip of the liquor. "I mean, with your reputation."

The other eyebrow lifted. "You have me agog, Stark."

"Come on. You can't tell me you don't **know** they call you a cocktease."

Her eyes narrowed.  Color bled up under her make-up.

 _Yeah, got a hit there._ Pissing someone off usually got him what he wanted--an honest reaction. _Didn't work with Obadiah,_ a voice in the back of his head answered. He ignored it.

He saw her take a breath, watched her eyelashes flutter, and studied how she turned down that rage into—something else; saw her change the wrath into another emotion. No: she converted or dialed down the anger into nothing at all, as if she could blow it out like cigarette smoke. The outraged scarlet bled away into nothing more than her skillfully-applied blush.

"So you got me again." Her tone turned brittle, ice cracking under the weight of the words. "Tell me, Stark. What's my price?"

Tony blinked. He frowned and leaned forward, staring into her eyes. "Your price?"

She gestured at the table. "This will cost me—or you, if you insist on paying—about $450. Plus tax and tip. Is that how much you expect to pay before I come across? What's your price? How much do I spend before you come across?"

He hadn't exactly thought of it in terms of a contract. "You flirt."

"So do you. Does everyone take you up on it?"

He leaned back, pursed his lips, and mulled that for a minute.  His immediate thought was 'Yes', but if he wanted to be truthful,  then… And he knew braggadocio wasn't going to get him what he wanted. _And what the hell do you want, anyway, Stark?_

Bruce drank another cup of tea.

"No," he said. "Aren't you interested in any of the men you date?"

"Are you asking if I'm solely lesbian? I thought we already established I swing both ways."

"No, I'm not asking that. I'm asking what would—" He narrowed his eyes again, found a phrase, and produced it. "Succeed in seducing you?"

This smile held no brittle edges. "More than pheasant under glass and a magnum of Dom Pérignon. I'm worth more than that."

"Yeah, you are."

Her lips parted, then closed.

"Speechless?"

"Don't get used to it."

He rolled his eyes, then grinned lopsidedly at her. "Never."

She choked on the last of the Calvados. This time he laughed at her.

"So…" Tony lifted an eyebrow, swallowed the last of the Scotch, and said, "The Taj?"

Bruce turned thoughtful. Too thoughtful. Then her eyes lit up like the Devil's fireplace, and she grinned at him. "I have a better idea. You come to Wayne Manor."

He started to say something. It stopped halfway out of his throat. He had a memory of a girl, not terribly drunk, but terribly vulnerable, who had looked at him across a table in the bar at the Waldorf-Astoria and said, _'I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours.'_ He studied her eyes now, made the decision, and nodded. "Mind if I drive?"

"Not at all."

*** *** ***

Bruce's butler was—flesh and blood. "Alfred, Mr. Stark and I have some matters to discuss."

"Yes, madam." Alfred held out a  silver tray. Flesh, blood, and with a Cockney accent--completely different from his faint mental image of Jarvis.

Bruce dropped the Bearcat's keys into it. "Noa's in the gatekeeper's flat?"

"No, madam, in the garage. She thinks the Rolls needs an adjustment." Alfred's manners were the perfect butler's, and his comprehensive scan of Tony from head to foot beat the metal detectors at any airport.

She nodded. "I hope she doesn't need to completely disassemble the engine.  Again."

The butler's reserved expression cracked into the faint suggestion of a smile. "Oh, I think it was a minor matter, madam. Shall I set up the library?"

Bruce nodded. "Yes, thank you, Alfred. I may be going out later; no need to put the car away now."

"Very well, madam." He turned away.

Tony froze. He'd seen Rhodey turn on his heel like that. At some point, Alfred had been in the military.

"The library's at the back of the house, in the northeast wing." Bruce started down the hallway.

His attention snapped back to her. Or at least to her ass, which was tight and rounded in a way that must have required a lot of hours in the gym, and which was shifting back and forth in a most distracting way under the red fabric.

"Tony!"

He realized that she'd been saying something. "What?"

She stopped and rested both fists on her hips, adding another interesting view to his contemplation. "Stop staring at my ass and give me your attention!"

Tony bit back a smile and muttered, "I can think of lots of things I'd like to give you.." then cleared his throat. "I'm listening."

"Uh-hunh." She looked over her shoulder at him in a very Lauren-Bacall manner. "Probably I should warn you that my hearing is--rather acute."

"And the rest of you is acute, too--"

Bruce started walking again. She pitched her voice to carry. "And that's your angle of attack?"

"No puns," he said. "Ground rules. No puns!"

"You started it."

"I'll give it up."

A laugh answered. She stopped at the end of the hall and waited.

"Ladies first," he said.

A curtsey mocked him, but the laughter still in her eyes pulled the sting. She sauntered into the library. He followed.

It seemed at first glance what he'd expected: something ossified from the mid-60s. The mid-1860s, actually. _But Wayne Manor burned to the ground, I thought the papers said…_

Mahogany shelves filled two walls. A mahogany desk stared out from the corner, with a comprehensive view of the Pleyel concert grand sitting in the bay window, the Gotham Sound visible through the window, and the door through which they'd entered.

"Pleyel?" he said. "Not Steinway?"

"My mother's piano was a Pleyel. It had been her mother's. I went for restoration of the _status quo_. And I like the Pleyel's tone." She went directly to the desk, thumbed a control under the desk, and waited while the apparently glass top of the desk lit up in blue iridescence. Her voice changed, becoming serious and dispassionate. "You need to be able to see the screen, of course."  She tapped her fingers on the desktop.

Tony moved behind her, watching over her shoulder as part of the desktop slid out and a cube rose from the slot. The desktop closed around it as the cube opened and turned into a flat screen. Another section of the top slid out and keys became visible, creating a second desk surface. Her side of the desk, lit up, was another keyboard, and the flat monitor was mounted, angled, underneath the clear top.

He tapped the desktop surface. A dull hollow sound answered. "Plexiglas?"

"Slightly different chemical makeup. A polysiliconate. Something R&D is working on. State offices are interested in it. It conducts electricity wherever silicon channels are arranged. The IT department uses it now and so does the secretarial staff. They do most of the computer work, so we have them do the testing. We have normal backup PCs we can roll in when something goes wrong, of course." She pulled a chair from under the desk. A button served to open it into a full chair. She motioned to the side of the room where another office chair sat. "It's made for two, but I don't use the second station often."

"I like it." He touched one of the etched keys. It reminded him of his keyboard, although the configuration wasn't the same. "Can this be designed with other keyboard configurations?" He pulled up the chair and settled into it, diagonally from her. In profile, Bruce's face acquired a sharp edge he didn't see looking when meeting her eyes.

He did get the quirk of her mouth, even in profile. "One of the engineers uses a Dvorak configuration. Another one set up his own ergonomic version by getting the compound to mold into wells."

"Nice. I don't suppose Wayne Enterprises would consider licensing the tech?" He pulled the chair over and dropped into it.

"I don't think this is one of the tech pieces that went walkabout to Stark already," she said. "Anything can come up for discussion, Tony. But you're going to want to talk to my CEO, Lucia Fox."

"You own Wayne Enterprises, don't you?"

Her lips pursed. "The majority of it, yes."

"Then I want to talk to you."

"Anything that involves the company has to include Ms. Fox," she said.

He stared at her. She raised an eyebrow.

"I am used to talking with the person who owns the company." He let ice frost the words.

Her eyebrow lifted further. "No, you're used to talking to the person who runs the company. In this case, that's Ms. Fox. I don't interfere with her decisions. I hired her--and I believe in letting people I hire do the job they were hired to do."

"Does that always work for you?"

Now the left eyebrow arched. "I didn't hire William Earle. He was a fixture before I came on the scene. Did you hire Stane?"

Tony grimaced. "Anybody ever tell you you're pain-in-the-ass stubborn?"

Her head lifted; she gave him her quirky, balls-tightening grin. "Obstinate as a fucking mule was the last comment of the kind, if I recall correctly."

From the door, Alfred cleared his throat. "Madam. I thought you and Mr. Stark might want something to drink."

"Thank you, Alfred."

He pulled a small end table from the corner and set the tray down on it, adjusted both decanters and the ice bucket, laid ice tongs across the bucket lid, then bowed to both of them and departed.

"Has Alfred been with you long?" Tony went over to check out the decanters. One smelt like malt whiskey. He dropped three ice cubes into a glass and added whiskey.

"Alfred's been with the family since before I was born. Dad met him in Vietnam--dad was a doctor in the US Navy. That's where he met Mom as well."

"Butlers in Vietnam?"

"Oh, Alfred was in the Royal Marines. He'd come from a family in service, though, if I remember correctly. I know some of the Pennyworths have worked in Buck House." Bruce slapped the side of her head. "Buckingham Palace. Alfred can call it Buck House, but I can't."

Tony laughed. "I can remember getting slapped upside the head for repeating things I shouldn't." He took a sip of the scotch, blinked, and looked down at the glass. Then he took a second sip. "Wow. What is this?"

"You don't like it? I know we've got Oban in the cellars." Bruce started to stand.

He motioned for her to stay seated. "Didn't mean that. This is--Oban doesn't stand up to it."

"Donnchadhisla. It's a Speyside. Single cask single malt."

"I've never heard of it."

"Wayne-owned distillery. In the family for a hundred or a hundred-fifty years, I don't recall which. Most of it is just made for local distribution in Scotland, but we always keep a couple of casks for ourselves and friends." She grinned at him. "And before you ask, I'll be happy to add you to the list. Would you pour me a glass of the Tokaji?"

"What's Tokaji?"

"Hungarian wine. They used to call it Tokay."

He sniffed it as he lifted the decanter, then took a second glass and poured a little in to taste it. "A little sweet, isn't it?"

"I like it as a change. It's one of my rare indulgences."

He brought her a filled glass. "Doesn't taste as if it has much alcohol in it."

"It doesn't." She took the glass from him, swallowed some of the wine, and motioned to her screen. "Here's the first set of emails. I had to have them restored, so they're in bits and pieces."

Tony sipped the Scotch as he tilted the monitor. "You have a virtual of Earle's hard drive on this?"

"Yes." She tapped out a shortcut, and the drive appeared in 3D on his monitor.

"You see the same view I do, right?"

"Yes."

He nodded. "All right. Plug this in for me." He pulled the memory key from the breast pocket of his shirt. "I never travel without my toolkit."

Bruce's eyebrows lifted again. "You promise this isn't going to invade my network?"

He rolled his eyes. "No, it's not going to invade your network. Just stick it in."

"Not going there," she said, as she inserted the key.

Tony laughed.  The key opened, offering him his utilities. He started taking the virtual drive apart. "There's always something left behind if someone's not careful. Hmm." He paused, reset the algorithm, and started again. "This is a hell of an encryption. Did Earle know computers?"

"Not from what I could find."

"Somebody built this encryption for him. It looks rather like—yeah, I think I see Obie's hand in this." He reset the algorithm once more and nodded as the bytes began to translate. "Just like a fingerprint." Tapping the screen, he expanded on his comment. "Everybody has their own tricks. You know the person, you know the tricks." _Not necessarily. I can crack any encryption he ever did, but I didn't know him well enough to know how much he hated me._

"I've had two years to learn a little." Her eyes flicked back and forth between his hands and her screen.  "Not nearly as much as you know."

He shrugged, used to the approval. "Part of my job." He pulled up a ghost drive, missing entries from the directories, deleted files, files that had been half-overwritten. It looked like at least five years' worth of material.

"Wait!"

He paused with his hands in the air.

Bruce stabbed a finger at the screen. "That invoice. Can you pull that up or is it only that couple of lines?"

"Hang on." He worked through the file, then turned the code into--an invoice. "Microwave emitter?"

Her eyes blazed blue fire. "That's the proof I was looking for. The bastard even signed it digitally."

"A position locator?"

"No." She took a deep breath, then stood up and walked away from the keyboard. After another second or two, she shrugged out of her jacket. The action pulled his attention away from the invoice. The sleeveless sheath revealed muscled arms and shoulders.

 _She lifts weights?_ He jerked his brain away from the image arising of Bruce in tank top and shorts, sweaty and glowing from exercise.

She rotated her shoulders, then rubbed the back of her neck. Then she pivoted on one heel, folded her arms, and glared down at him. "It vaporizes matter. Specifically, it vaporizes water."

Stark Industries hadn't made weapons for fifty-odd years for nothing. "Like an enemy's water supply. Or water containing something that would become airborne."

Bruce went on staring down at him. "That would be biological warfare. That would be illegal."

He leaned back in the chair and folded his arms. "You know, your being four inches taller than I am in heels does not intimidate me."

She promptly stepped out of her heels. "Five inches. I'm two inches taller than you are **without** heels."

"Still doesn't intimidate me."

"I'll think of something. Anything else?"

" **I** didn't think Wayne Enterprises was in the weapons business." He damn sure hadn't had any idea Wayne Enterprises was nibbling at the leftovers. "I know most of my competitors."

Bruce threw out both arms, much as he had in Afghanistan, introducing his super-weapon. "And there you have it. I didn't know we were in the weapons business either. I know there are defensive materials in R&D that the government's passed on, but I didn't know about this until after I fired Earle."

"What did you fire him for?"

"Trying to take Wayne Enterprises public, for one thing. For another, I didn't like his expense sheets.  And the call logs were backed up, but he didn't know that, so he thought no one knew about his phone calls to Stane. Excuse me. To **Mr**. Stane."

"Call him anything you like," Tony said. "Doesn't matter shit to me." The words fell out and laid there, like corpses on the Persian carpet under the piano. He froze, shocked at the naked rage.

A fractional narrowing of her eyes said she noticed, but the expression vanished at once. "Suppose it doesn't matter to him either, now. We weren't supposed to be in the weapons industry." She leaned over her chair, peering at the monitor. "The shipping address on this is Pakistan."

"What happened to the microwave emitter?"

"That's what I'm trying to figure out." She sat down, smoothed her skirt, then pulled up a few more items. "This was erased and I did get it back. A deleted inventory item that lists the microwave emitter. A deleted purchase order from Enate Distributors. You think maybe you can find shipping manifests in this for me?"

"Enate." Stane backwards. Not terribly clever. _He didn't think he had to be clever--after all, I gave him the whole works on one of those silver platters Wayne Manor has so many of._   "I know that Pakistan address. Most of Stark Industries' samples go through there before they arrive in Afghanistan." He poked through the recovered files again. "I can find shipping manifests if they're in here. When did it arrive?"

"It didn't."

The call logs popped up at a click. She circled dates. "This is the date the emitter was shipped. This date is the first call from Stane. This is Earle's response. We get a flurry of calls for the next three days, and then nothing."

"And then?"

"And then Gotham City went through those riots that hit the national news."

Tony swung the chair around. This time he stood up.

He had to give Bruce Wayne one thing--she didn't back away. She didn't flinch. She stared at him.

"That's a pretty big leap. How would a missing microwave emitter that should have been in Pakistan affect riots in Gotham City?"

"The police didn't let the news media in until everything was under control. That took a day or two. Martial law." Bruce tapped a finger against her lower lip. She looked past him, out at the night sky. "I can't tell you where I got my information. The riots started when something vaporized sections of the city's water supplies and a psychotropic toxin was released into the air."

He nodded. "It would fit. And you think Stane had bought the emitter?"

"I think so. I don't have enough proof yet."

Tony nodded once more. "So we'll get you proof."

Bruce was still for a moment. Then she began to shut down the computer, carefully checking and stowing each item in separate folders. "You sure you want to be involved with this? You don't want to talk to a lawyer first?"

"I've spent six months talking to lawyers. Why do I want more now?"

"Is Stark Industries limited liability?"

"Yes."

"So is Wayne Enterprises. If I put Earle where I want him, then it's not going to affect the firm. It's just his malfeasance. What if you and I prove Stane was involved in illegal trafficking of secrets and weapons?"

He held back. He could have given her as much as she'd given him. He could have told her a little as a good-faith gesture. He said, "It won't affect Stark Industries." _Anymore than it already has._

Bruce's shoulders relaxed. She watched him for a second longer, but his poker face still held good. "All right, then."

A discreet rap on the door was followed by Alfred. "It's 10:56, Miss Wayne."

"Thank you, Alfred." Bruce finished shutting down the PC. "Ask Noa to bring the car around."

"Very good, madam." Alfred bowed and left.

"Kicking me out?" Tony slid a plaintive edge into his words.

"I need a couple of hours of sleep before morning. I've already read you can go a week without sleep. I'm afraid I'm not up to that."

"I'd love to find out what you are up to," he murmured, moving closer, staring into her eyes.

Bruce put her index finger against his lips. "Maybe another time."

Tony sighed. "You will walk me to the door, at least?"

"Walk you to the door? If the Rolls isn't repaired, I'm driving you to your hotel."

"You should have let me bring my rental."

"Don't trust my driving?"

He slid an arm around her waist. Bruce didn't protest. "You haven't driven me yet, have you?"

"True. Not even crazy."

Tony pursed his lips, cocked his head, and considered that. "Well, according to any number of Senators and stockholders, I am already crazy. Wouldn't be far to drive."

The Rolls-Royce turned out to be a vintage Phantom IV. Alfred stood by the back passenger door, waiting.

Tony let go of her in order to walk around the car. Gorgeous. An absolutely perfect car--of its type. "Do you own any new cars?"

"Not at the present, no. I **am** considering a truck for the field and garden work. The one the gardener uses is just about at the end of its useful life."

He eyed the Phantom. "I do have to say it's got an air."

"My dad never used it," she said. "Took the elevated everywhere."

Tony saw Alfred's face tighten. Nothing was said, though. "What time tomorrow?"

"Alfred will pick you up at nine. Will that be all right?"

"Fine. I get to sleep in."

Bruce smiled. "Don't worry. I'll put you to work soon enough."

*** *** ***

June the 25th. Chloe shivered as a cool breeze blew across the roof of the Herald-Tribune building. The Beaux-Arts tower no longer loomed over all the other buildings in Gotham City, as it had in the 1890s; buildings like Wayne Tower or any of LuthorCorp's glass skyscrapers easily topped it. But it did offer an unparalleled view of the Narrows and the twisting streets that threaded through the oldest part of Gotham City.

Probably why Batman liked it as a perch.

Chloe kept out of the range of the motion lights arranged around the antenna tower. Practice had taught her which corners and which areas were safe. The breeze picked up strength; she shivered again. She should have brought a sweater.

Peering through the crenellations, she watched the pinpoint lights below. New streetlights didn't always last in the Narrows. More still stood, though, than had some six months earlier. Even the criminals liked a little light now, were a little less confident.

The Joker had marked them all.

A deep monotone alerted her. "I said I'd leave the information in the usual place."

"I wanted to be sure I got it." Chloe held out her hand.

After a moment, the gauntlet lifted, turned over,  and a thumb drive dropped into Chloe's palm. "Photos, cell logs, recorded cell calls."

"Legal because no phones were tapped." Chloe flicked a glance upwards, saw the mask relax around the mouth.

"Probably no good without confirmation." The broad armored shoulders shrugged. The mask swung her way. The shadows falling over the peaked ears shielded human eyes. "I don't want you taking too many risks."

"Corbett is crooked. The cops know it, the criminals know it—the mayor knows it. We just have to prove it."

"One of these calls mentioned another town. Star City. And San Francisco. Look for birth and death certificates for a family called Marion. Check for a name change about thirty years ago."

Chloe cocked her head. "Marion—to Corbett?"

A nod, slow due to the armor. The throat area had been strengthened, probably, after the encounters with the Joker, and padded to protect the distortion mike which changed an alto to a baritone.

"A name change—identity change—" She got it, then. "Identity theft."

A finger raised.

She nodded. Best not to say anything out loud. "That's enough to go on." She started to step away from the parapet, staying within the safe zone.

"Wait."

She turned back.

The Batman's mouth tightened. The faint suggestion of eyelids blinking added some life to the mask. "Something else. This could be dangerous."

She held out her hand.

Another drive dropped into her palm. "This is different. Shipping manifests. Some invoices. I need to trace the companies. I've hit a dead end."

"I can do that."

A long sigh answered. "I know. No traces."

Now, indignant, she said, "I know what I'm doing."

"I know you do.  If you have any concerns, get in touch."

She nodded.

"I have to go. Wait until after I'm gone."

Chloe leaned forward to whisper, "Teach your grandmother to suck eggs."

A faint smile softened the mask. Batman stepped up onto the parapet, stood silhouetted for a fraction of a second against the sky, and then sank into the shadows below the building, riding the cool air.

She felt the gust kicked up by the cape, and shut her eyes for a second against the dust. _Be careful, Bruce. God, **please** be careful._

*** *** ***

In Crime Alley, at midnight on June twenty-sixth, the bells of the First Congregational Church could be heard, a distant ringing of the great Lincoln Bell counting out the strokes to twelve. Eight brass bells, a full set, hung in the white stone tower. Four had been recast after lightning hit the church in 1864, on the date of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Wayne family money had paid for three of the recast bells. Congregational support had rebuilt the church in stone, not in wood, and the granite Gothic tower loomed now over the modernized downtown, striking the hours and chiming the quarter-hours as it had for over a hundred years.

The elevated, repaired and running, rumbled off to her left. Her grandfather's big contribution to the city was half the age of the church.

For her, this anniversary was only the twenty-first—she stood on the rooftop of a newly-constructed office building which had replaced the low-income apartments overlooking the alley in which her mother and father had died. She'd missed seven anniversaries while roaming the underworld. And now Batman stood on a rooftop overlooking an empty street in the oldest part of the city north of the Narrows, staring down at a memory covered in newly-laid concrete.

A Tuesday, this anniversary—the Opera House had no performances tonight, the late-night art-movie houses had closed for the night, and the sole bar near Crime Alley, O'Phelan's, sounded subdued and half-empty. How ironic that Lex Luthor, of all people, should have bid on and demolished the condemned projects six months before her homecoming.

 _Henri would call me self-indulgent, wallowing in the past. And he'd be right._ She stretched, unfolded, and looked around herself. A turn over the Narrows, staying out of the streetlights, and then home. Morning would come too early, otherwise, since it included staying one step ahead of Tony Stark.

She heard it before visual sonar and infrared kicked in. For a fraction of second, before the dampers activated, she stood stunned. She tasted metal, knew it for blood, and saw the flare of sound two blocks down.

Rooftop to rooftop to unfinished construction… Bruce crouched on a crane extended above the sidewalk, closed her eyes for a second against the sonar flare, then opened to see—Tony Stark.

Tony Stark stood in Crime Alley, with three men on the gravel and dirt around him. Whatever sonic gadget he must have used had dropped them like fossils from Pompeii. Infrared showed no cooling. They weren't dead. Neither were the three men coming out of the construction behind him.

Tony Stark stood in Crime Alley in Gotham City with three men on the ground in front of him and three men coming up behind him he hadn't noticed yet.

And the last thing Gotham City needed—the last thing **she** needed—was multimillionaire playboy Iron Man Tony fucking Stark walking through Crime Alley in the middle of the night and ending up mugged, murdered, or held for ransom.

Bruce plunged down from the crane, cut the parabola as per Archimedes, and took out one man with a sweep of her cape edge. The second knew some jiu-jitsu, and the third carried a taser. _Ransom, probably, then._ She exploded. She forced herself to release the third man before she did permanent damage to his shoulder.

One of Stark's three stirred.

Stark said, "Watch your ears," then pointed something at them.

The dampers cut in again. At the first blare of white, she shut her eyes. When she opened them, the men were still again.

"They'll be all right," he said. "It's not permanent."

She took several deep breaths, with her heart thudding in her ears, wanting nothing more than to kick him where it would hurt his arrogance most. After a second, she managed to say, "You should have worn your iron suit."

"It's a gold-titanium alloy, actually," he said. "Stronger than steel. I have to say your armor's impressive, though." He slid his hands into the pockets of his lambskin bomber jacket; the leather jacket was one more surreal thing on a hot Gotham night. "I thought my suit might be overkill."

 _Overkill for Gotham City on a June night._ Adrenaline started to wear off, already, leaving her drained and weary. "I'm relieved to hear it. Gotham isn't Afghanistan." _Yet._

"Yet," he said.

Her hands clenched. It took her another few seconds to relax them, to rein herself in. "Can I suggest you pick some other spot for a midnight stroll than Crime Alley?"

"Crime Alley?" He turned his head to look at the street sign: **_Loll's Lane_**.

She spread out a hand. "Once the most dangerous street north of the Narrows. Still not a tourist attraction. If you're looking for hookers, Stark, try the Gansevoort Market district—four streets north and east towards the Sound. If you want rent boys, you should  head west for the Triangle."

"I found what I was looking for."

She cocked her head, waiting.

"You."

 _Curiosity killed the cat._ "You couldn't have taken out an ad in the papers?"

"I've been told you don't do interviews." He crossed his arms. "And I wanted to talk to **you** , not to a reporter asking me questions about an ad in the papers."

 _My God, the man is nothing but ego!_ "I'm not known for a sense of humor. This is becoming tedious."

"Why did you do it?"

Two of hers were stirring. She turned her back on him, pulled out plastic ties, and trussed all three. Another three sets of ties she tossed at him.

He caught them.

"As long as we're talking, make yourself useful." Coming down off adrenaline was a bitch.

Stark examined the ties, then applied them with the neat precision of a trained engineer. He straightened, looked at her, and said, again, "Why did you do it?"

He'd said Bruce Wayne didn't intimidate him. Maybe Batman didn't intimidate him either. That suggested he either took Batman seriously or was insane. _These days, who knows? He didn't come back from Afghanistan unchanged._ She watched him, keeping her attention on his arms, looking for signs of tension. "You have a satellite phone? We use 911 here as well."

Not a twitch. His eyes stayed on her. "You didn't kill those cops. I don't know who did, and right now I don't care. But you took the blame. Why?"

"It was necessary." She could hear Henri laughing half a world away as the words fell out of her mouth.

A nod answered. "Have you considered that stepping outside of Gotham City for a while might offer a chance to rebuild your reputation?"

 _Curiouser and curiouser…_ She shook her head. "No. I don't run."

"The reputation repair would be a side-benefit. What you can do can affect more than this city—"

She held up a hand.

This time, he stopped.

"Gotham is my concern, Stark."

"Your country? The world? Those aren't your concerns?"

Her jaw ached. She relaxed her fists yet once more. "You fight wars, Stark. I fight crime. It's a petty concern, I know. But I'm committed to it."

"Committed. That's what they do to crazy people, isn't it?"

A faint song of sirens floated over the street. "I'm not the one standing on a empty street arguing ethics with someone wearing a mask." She jerked her head towards the strident sirens. "I think they're playing your song."

"Sure it's not for you?"

 _As thick as a titanium wall._ "I rather think it's you. Tony Stark in Crime Alley won't go unnoticed. You've woken a lot of sleeping cops tonight. And probably earned some informant enough money for a Mount Everest-size high." The crane was her best chance. She caught a strut with the gun, swung herself up, and sped off across the rooftops.

Behind her she heard the screech of brakes and the sound of outraged voices.

 _One hell of a twenty-first anniversary._

*** *** ***

Tony was trimming his beard when his cell phone rang. He flipped it open, saw Pepper's face, and winced. The Gotham City Herald-Tribune lay open on his bed. He had hoped Jarvis might not have picked it up.  _You designed him. You know better._ "Morning, Potts. The house still standing?"

"Tony, this thing about Batman rescuing you is all over the news. What the hell is going on there?"

"Nothing, nothing at all. I took a walk last night, almost got mugged, and Batman stepped in." He waited for the responding blast, imagining he could smell sulfur and brimstone all the way from Malibu.

"Mr. Stark."

 _Whoops. Not good._   "Yes, Ms. Potts."

"I would really appreciate it if  you could avoid getting yourself killed before the board of directors meeting in August. I would appreciate it even more if you would avoid getting yourself killed before you've hired a new CEO. With that in mind, please remember that next week you have 10 interviews for that position."

"Maybe I'll just run it myself. How hard can it be?"

Nothing but faint static could be heard for a few seconds. Then Pepper said, "Are you really sure you want to do that?"

He stomped down the urge to say how much easier it would make his life at the moment if he didn't have to interview strangers for a job he wasn't sure he could trust them to do. "I don't know. I'm going to think it over very carefully."   _Oh, yeah, am I going to think about it. I may have just swallowed my foot._ "Of course, if **you'd** like the job--"

"Will that be all, Mr. Stark?" He couldn't see her roll her eyes, but he could hear the patience in her voice.

"When you get a chance, find me a good barber in Gotham City. That will be all, Ms. Potts." He grinned at the phone, noticed that it was 7:45 already, and rushed with the remainder of the trim and fitting himself into his suit. He stopped in the lobby to buy the Herald-Tribune.

Chloe Sullivan's article on Batman rescuing Tony Stark took over three-quarters of the front page, with an excellent photo of him standing in the middle of the swarm of police who were inserting his assailants into a string of police cars. _Good girl. Definitely going to have to take you to lunch again._ The article stopped, with a _'continued on page A24'_ note and a callout to read the _'Tony Stark interview in Today's People section'_.

He carried the paper with him into the hotel restaurant and settled down with coffee, fresh croissants, and a morning Scotch. He skimmed the article while he ate scrambled eggs. Naturally, the Taj Boston's eggs were as far from the ones he scrambled for himself as any eggs could be. _Really have to work on expanding Jarvis' capabilities to cooking._ Pepper would order him anything he wanted, including pizza from New York City, but she drew the line at cooking for him. Although once she had opened a can of chicken and rice soup for him when he was sick…

Nothing to complain about in the article, either. Chloe was conscientious and pithy. The article showed him off better than Caroline--Catherine--Krystal-- _whatever the hell her name was_ \--than the last journalist's article had. The main article also had the latest PR photo attached to it. He eyed it critically; maybe the next one shouldn't show him with the sunglasses.

A timer ticked in his head. Tony glanced at his watch. Ten minutes to nine. He signed for the bill, folded up the paper, and stepped outside into the bright sunshine of Gotham City on a summer morning.  His phone buzzed, and he pulled it out, squinting at the display.

One text message, from Pepper, with the name, phone number, and address of a Gotham barber--Sylvester's--with directions. He grinned when he read them. _Leave hotel. Turn right. Go to end of street and cross when light changes to green. Turn left. Look across street. Owner was co-owner with your regular barber in LA and decided to set up shop in his home town._ After a moment, another line of text came through. _What is it about Gotham City anyway, that so many people end up there rather than in California where it's warm?_

"It's warm enough here now," Tony murmured, as he shut the phone and put it away. He donned his sunglasses before scanning the street. Gotham City's skyline showed off better from the Sound, but even here he could pick out the curved sides of the repaired Wayne Enterprises Tower, the green-glass and steel knife-blade of the LutherCorp Building, the Gothic fortress of the Federal Reserve, and the bland rectangle of John Hancock Place, all surmounted by the new Gotham Financial Tower. To either side of the Taj, he noted new luxury condos with Art Deco touches. A crane towered over someone several blocks away. Certainly there were more skyscrapers, but not visible from his angle--and staring up at a skyline was something tourists did, not CEOs on business trips. A very pretty woman walking two small Papillons caught his attention; he smiled, she smiled, and he watched her walk by on her scarlet stilettos.

Nice to be in a city where he wouldn't be recognized by an ordinary woman on the street. Where bodyguards and policemen didn't show up the minute his feet hit the ground.

The distinctive purr of a Rolls engine hit his ear. He glanced towards the sound. If there were two vintage Phantom IVs in Gotham City, he'd give up drinking for tonight. The Phantom pulled up to the curb.

The Taj's doorman glanced at him. "Your car, Mr. Stark?"

 _So maybe I'm not so anonymous._ He cleared his throat. "Yes, thank you." This was Gotham City. He remembered to tip the man for holding the car door.

The only one in the Rolls was Alfred. Butler and chauffeur in one; was he also the cook or was there only one other person in the Wayne ménage? _No, you forgot the bodyguard._

"Good morning, Mr. Stark."

"Good morning, Alfred. Is Miss Wayne already at her office?"

"No, sir. We're picking her up on the way."

"Ah. She stop to get her nails done?"

Alfred remained polite. "No, sir." And uncommunicative.

He didn't often notice whether or not people approved of him. But he couldn't tell about Alfred, and that was unnerving.

The Rolls sped out of the downtown, and turned onto a long winding drive that reached into the outskirts of Gotham City. Here they passed empty fields of rolling grass and trees, surprising to see when they'd passed office buildings and condos not quite 15 minutes earlier. Tony glanced around, oriented himself, and noted that they were in the general area of Wayne Manor with its great acreage.

They passed a long fence, a beautifully-wrought length of iron palings curved into lilies. Another minute before his brain made the connection. Funeral lilies. Confirming his recognition, the limo made a right turn and passed beneath an archway which offered the inscription: Congregational Burying Ground. He grimaced, then wiped the expression. "Does Miss Wayne often visit cemeteries in the morning?"

"No, sir, but this is the anniversary of her parents' death. She does make it a ritual to visit on this day."

"What about the time she spent in Asia?"

Alfred said, in a very distant and polite tone, "Well, I don't know for certain, sir, but I think it might have been a bit of a distance."

 _Shot yourself in the foot there, didn't you, Stark?_ "Yes, of course." After a second, he heard himself add, "Sorry." And he couldn't remember when the last time he had said, 'Sorry.'

"Not at all, Mr. Stark."

The Wayne family mausoleum occupied an entire corner of the cemetery: an austere stone building nearly as large as a cottage, surrounded by rose bushes and a velvet lawn.


End file.
